Candoto (YTB-377)
1944-1946
(YTB-377: displacement 318 (full load); length 102'0"; beam 24'0"; draft 10'5"; speed 12 knots; complement 18; class Allaquippa)
The harbor tug YT-377 was laid down and launched at Port Arthur, Texas, by the Gulfport Boiler & Welding Works; named Candoto and redesignated as a big harbor tug, YTB-377, on 15 May 1944; delivered to the Navy on 10 June 1944 and placed in service on 4 July [Independence Day] 1944, Lt. (j.g.) N. J. Batrick, USNR, officer-in-charge.
Assigned to the Service Force of the Pacific Fleet, Candoto set course for the Territory of Hawaii and the Fourteenth Naval District on 29 July 1944. Proceeding via the Panama Canal, the big harbor tug operated initially at Pearl Harbor (July 1944--February 1945), then sailed in convoy for the western Carolines, towing the tank landing craft LCT-1185 (4 February--17 March 1945) and reaching Ulithi at the end of that voyage. Subsequently, she was stationed at the anchorage at Manicani, Samar, Philippine Islands, by July 1945.
Taken out of service and placed in reserve, Candoto was stricken from the Naval Register on 12 April 1946, and acquired by the Crowley Towing firm of San Francisco, Calif., in 1947, which renamed her Sea Horse, and operated her under that name for over three and a half decades, until selling the vessel around 1984. She changed hands over the next decade, earmarked at the start of that period for conversion to a "fish packer," then being converted to a yacht.
A W.A. Gardner of Langley, Wash., acquired the vessel , documenting her as N T Covenant (1989), after which she was registered to the Seattle, Wash.,-based Covenant Ministries (1992). Lee Ellis of Issaquah, Wash., became the next owner, renaming her Sea Horse (1994). Five years later, ownership again changed, when a Pamela L. Oftedal, of Yakima, Wash., purchased her (1999). Soon thereafter, however (2001), the ship lost her U.S. registration
Ex-Candoto then became a recreational barge, Raggedy Ann (2003), registered to Big River Marine Services, of Lakeview, Michigan, despite her "expired documentation." Subsequently, she underwent another change of name, becoming Seahorse, when documented with Canadian registry by Dale Romagnolli and Lori Teather of Salt Spring Island, British Columbia, in 2012. Eight years later (2020), Seahorse was still in operation as a yacht.
Robert J. Cressman
31 January 2022
